Speaker 1: What is great about COLT, that in creating that, I really wanted for COLT, which is Campus Organization Leadership Training, to be a couple of things. I wanted it to be as comprehensive as possible, even though knowing I can't cover every possibility or eventuality in a program, but giving these students as much as I can, I present it in a way that they have a resource that they will always be able to refer back to. They get handouts, and they complete those as we go through the program, as we go through the activities, writing down their thoughts, as well as ideas and fill in the blanks. When I teach how to close the sale, engaging more students in campus organizations through effective recruitment, I go through the steps that work, because I have recruited more than 10,000 students into campus organizations, and I show the student leaders how to do that. I do it from a practical standpoint, but I also want them to have something that they can refer back to and look at, that even if they go, man, that guy was great, he was awesome, I don't want them to three days later go, what did he say? I want them to have that tool that they can always go back to, and as far as I've come across, I don't know of anybody else who's really doing that and providing that kind of a resource to the student leaders, and so COLT is intended to be a great training program, a great way to give a lot of information in a short amount of time, to apply some things in very practical ways, but also to serve as an ongoing resource for that student and the organization. We tend to focus on the officers of organizations, we have more of an emphasis on club presidents or campus organization presidents, and I think every student leader needs to have that training. There are students who get elected to roles they have absolutely no idea what to do. They get elected to be vice president, and it's a very ambiguous position in most groups, but every group has one, and that person is there in case of what, the president doesn't show up, they quit or something school, they quit the organization, so they really don't have a practical, functional way of really serving the organization, and that's what I teach them, and I teach them how they can look beyond their duties, the same thing with club treasurers. Lots of organizations don't handle money if they have a club treasurer, why? And so I teach them how they can really have an impact on the organization as a leader and grow in their leadership abilities. I also think that student leaders who may not be in formal roles are valuable to train in leadership training, running better organizations, because they're going to be the future leaders of those organizations, so if they're a chair of a project or a committee, or they have some other responsibility on the organization, they're going to benefit from that training, and so I think if we could get every member of every organization to come, that would be great, I think they'd all benefit, but I would reach a little bit beyond the club officers and try to get more students involved. It's important to have training every year at the school because you have different students moving into leadership roles, students move into various leadership roles, they might have been in a role in one organization, now they're in something else in another, or they've moved up within that organization, they have a different perspective and they see things in different ways than they did a year before, they've had that opportunity of going through leadership training, sometimes the year before, and now they can come back and go, alright, this is what I learned last year, here's how I used it, now what am I going to learn this year? And even if it's a school that brings me back, I have a variety of different topics and programs that I'm able to provide to these students, and they're able to learn in different ways, and even sometimes using the same activities or even some of the same material, they learn new things, because they're looking at the world in a different way, they're looking at their world in a different way, and their experiences have changed them. So I think it needs to be done every year in order to provide the consistency that is necessary for organizations and students to be successful, and also to continue that growth process of going from one year to the next, and always knowing that you have new students coming into campus and into leadership roles who need to get that jump start that the other folks have benefited from in previous years. What I teach the students is that if they're more confident as a leader, if they use their time more effectively, if they learn how to deal with conflict and drama, then they can have that same sort of impact on other students. I really teach in the training that I do, and I show the students how they can take that and apply it within their organization, working with other students who weren't there for that training, as well as carry that on into roommate relationships, personal relationships, family relationships, and even job environments that they might have. I talk to them about that, and I take time after we do an activity or I have a training piece to say, now here's how you could apply this in these other ways. And so that's how they can impact on the other students on their campus, is to teach them the types of things I'm teaching them, to share with them, hey, we had this great training and I learned this thing that I want to share with you, as well as putting into practice the tools that I give them, the ideas that they have, the concepts that I'm sharing with the other students on campus. And then hopefully those students will get excited and go, oh man, I wish I hadn't missed that, and then they'll come to the next one, whether it's with me or somebody else on campus, and then that will build and become a snowball of students really getting excited about leadership. I was a state advisor for 18 years for a collegiate service group, and I saw these types of things happen, students who blossomed and grew from their experiences. Students who have gone on to have very successful careers because of the leadership experiences that they had as college students, and the opportunities that were afforded to them. The support that they received from me as an advisor, and as much as possible I have tried to recreate that in Running Better Organizations and campus organization leadership training, so that the students will be able to take these ideas, these thoughts, these principles, these practical tools, and use them to their benefit. That was why I wanted to create this, because I see a gap on campuses of who gets these opportunities for leadership development. A lot of times it's the student government, a lot of times it's the planning board, the residence hall association, which is great and valuable, and they need to have that, but there are so many other students who should have access to this type of training, and so that is the reason why I created it. We were fortunate that we were able to take our student leaders and our organization and give this to them, but there are so many students on campus who never are afforded the opportunity, and that's what this program is intended to do. I get the students interacting with one another in fun ways, but in practical ways. There's always a point to any interactives that I do. I don't do games for the sake of doing games, I always have a reason for that, and I want them to be duplicatable, that whatever they do with me, whatever experiences they have, they can recreate in their own meetings or their own organization, and so that is something I think that sets me apart in that they have fun. They enjoy it, but when they're done, I have so many students who go, wow, I never knew I could learn so much, and so they are able to take that practical takeaways, and it's not spoon fed to them. They go through the experience, and then they, wow, this is what I learned, and that's the kind of feedback that I get, and that's the type of thing that really gets me excited when I see students having these experiences, and sometimes, maybe before they came in, they weren't quite sure what was going to happen, what they were going to get, and afterwards, they do seem to be just blown away that it was one of the best things they ever experienced. I've had great success working with older groups and professional groups, but there's just some sort of a level of energy and excitement, and you can see this exponential growth happen in short periods of time. Someone who goes from being a freshman to a sophomore, and a sophomore to a junior, junior to a senior, they change so dramatically, and in those times that I'm with them, I get such a great opportunity to have an impact on that, and give them tools they can use, things that will help them to get where they want to go, and get the most out of their educational experience. So I find it very valuable because it really frames and shapes who they are, and I'm excited to be a part of that.